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Sunday, January 8, 2017

Is Bad Research on PTSD Considered Fake News?

Bad Research on PTSD ContinuesCombat PTSD Wounded TimesKathie CostosJanuary 8, 2017When we buy something to ingest, most products come with an expiration date to let us know when the good time has run out and it can make us sick if we use it. So why hasn't bad research ever included an expiration date? After all, the research on PTSD has been going on for over 40 years. Most of the "research" being done now has been repeated, dismissed or expanded on, yet reading most of the new research is more like reading a shampoo bottle with "wash, rinse and repeat."The so called new or ground breaking research was washed out but if you are new to all of this, you were not warned about how long great research has sat on the shelf gathering dust. Congress has a habit of taking what they think is new and then fund it so they can appear to be informed but we've suffered for their lack of curiosity and inability to direct their staff to research the subject. In the case of veterans with PTSD, that neglect has been deadly while making the rest of us sick over the results.In 1999 the Department of Veterans Affairs research put the number of veterans committing suicide at 20 a day. If you got up to page 18 on this report you'd find this chart.

If that number sounds familiar, it should. They came out with that same number in their latest report. What they did not say was back in 1999, there were over 5 million more veterans in the country.When doing any kind of research, the findings should only be taken seriously if the previous research was actually reviewed.I consider most of the reporting being done on PTSD fake news. This morning was one of those encounters with an article that made me want to go back into my bed and cover my head.This was my first clue that this article should not be taken seriously.

"In earlier studies, Morozov and Wataru Ito - a research assistant professor at the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute - investigated observational fear in a rodent model. They found that animals that witnessed stress in others, without experiencing any negative events themselves, displayed an increased fear response in other situations."

Rodents still being studied? Seriously? Ok, in the beginning when there were not enough people talking about having PTSD, that kind of made sense. But that need was obliterated about 40 years ago. With around 7 million Americans walking around with PTSD, you know, actual people they are supposedly trying to understand, the supply of human lab rats was readily available. Great researchers understood that way back then.

Simply observing fear in others changes brain connectivityMedical News TodayTim NewmanJanuary 8, 2017
Research shows that it is not necessary to experience trauma directly to be affected by it. A recent study provides evidence that simply being around someone who has had a stressful experience can make changes to the way the brain processes information.
Research shows that observing other's stresses can change connectivity in the brain.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) develops in some people following a frightening, dangerous, or shocking event.
Although most people do not develop PTSD after such an experience, an estimated 7-8 percent of people in the United States will experience PTSD during their life.
Symptoms vary from individual to individual, but can include flashbacks, intrusive negative thoughts, avoiding places, events, or objects, and being easily startled.
Even if a specific event does not trigger PTSD at the time, it raises the chance of an individual developing it at a later date.
read more of this here.

Enough of that nonsense. Not living through an event/situation/circumstance, yet developing PTSD actually has a term and it is called Secondary PTSD.This is from the Department of Veterans Affairs on how caregivers develop Secondary PTSD.Partners of Veterans with PTSD: Research Findings

This is about those who work with veterans or anyone else living with PTSD.This is from 2007 article on counselors developing PTSD list of references at the bottom, indicating that this article is far from new research. I do not agree with the report itself because it dismisses what many experts have been proven right on. Treating people, not rats, for PTSD requires a triple play of treating their mind, their body and their spirit/soul. Leave one out and healing does not happen to the whole person.
Secondary Traumatic Stress, Compassion Fatigue and Counselor Spirituality: Implications for Counselors Working with Trauma

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